I made quite a lot of development sketches before and while creating the animation. This helped me to figure out how the action would play out. Here are the storyboards I drew up (which I made into an animatic that I posted on the blog earlier on):
The environment had to be clearly altered by the ball's movement. So I wanted to show the room before the rubber ball was let loose by the canine character, the ball then beginning a chain of reactions with the objects within the room, then the room at the end of the film after it had been completely dismantled by the balls actions and everything is in a mess. But the dog is happy because he got the ball, plus a tin of biscuits that fell of a shelf! (loosely inspired by the risk project also, and all those quotes about taking risks like jumping on a dodgy shelf to get a rubber ball. It is sometimes a good thing to do and has it's benefits... like biscuits).
I wanted the room to be a sort of 'W.Heath Robinson/Inventor's studio' so I put in a contraption/invention that would help the chain of reactions and relate back to this original inspiration. It could also help the narrative and animation be a bit more dramatic, although probably quite far-fetched. Then again however - Robinson's inventions are very far-fetched and silly!
I decided this contraption should be a tea making machine because I noticed a few of his sketches included people having tea (I especially liked the one of a horse's head being used as a tea tray... very silly of course... but I managed to reference it very briefly in my final film, so see if you can spot it!!). Designing the tea making contraption was challenging and took a lot of thinking through and sketching out ideas! I took most inspiration from Robinson - his designs also included lots of cogs, wheels and strings. I think the final version of the invention in my film is still a bit unbelievable, but with more time maybe I could have made it work a bit better. Keep in mind when watching the final film that the contraption is meant to be a "work in progress" and any disturbance could cause havoc!
(also if you remember the video by "OK Go" in my initial research post, that is where the inspiration for the piano came from. There is something very comical about a piano... whether I achieve that in my own film I don't know, probably not, but I can but try!!).
I wanted to know whether the animation would work timing and movement wise - so I sketched all the scenes first which I would then go over later with pen, neatening up the animation and the sketch lines. Here is the sketch test I made:
This sketch test was the task that took the longest time during this project; I was a bit slow and relaxed when creating it, and I now think I should have made done this much quicker so I could focus more time on finishing up the final animation. But I have learnt much from this project again!
When working on this project I also realized the importance of the previous project! What I learned from making the simple bouncing ball animations was vital when creating this animation. Not only was I again animating a bouncy rubber ball but also a dog jumping, a tin falling of a shelf, a kettle and tea cup falling, and piano wheel - for all these things I had to think about weight, material, arcs, and the time these things would take to fall and jump and land etc.
The final film will be posted very soon...
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